


Pout

by Ladycat



Series: The Adventures of Meredith Sheppard-McKay [2]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-12 00:08:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s pouting at them now, John notes, amused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pout

“No!”

“Oh, for Ch—er, that is, I don’t care!”

“No! No, no, no!”

The door whispers open for him as he approaches, granting him entrance that’s far more difficult for just about anyone else to obtain. Golden sunlight puddles around his feet to form a winding path through the apartment, glittering cheerfully as it finds reflective surfaces to dance with. John edges through carefully, wary of small objects that can lurk in deceptively absent shadows; fears of a broken ankle are superseded in favor of interrupting something that really shouldn’t be.

“You are—are a word I can’t say right now!” Rodney rants, voice rising hysterically.

It’s like something out of a movie. The kitchen is lemon-yellow and almost absurdly bright, one of the few places in all of Atlantis to escape the more murky blues and ethereal greens that color the rest of her interior, framed by a large picture window that’s open to allow a cool breeze to sweep through the whole apartment. Green plants dot the frequent ledges, a hanging pot allowing graceful fronds to waft and wave as it twists back and forth. The equipment that forms the counters and more that rests on top of them are all high-tech, of course. No hotplates or primitively wired coffee machines here, oh no. It’s like something out of _Alien Better Homes and Gardens_. Gary Marshall, eat your heart out.

But all of that is backdrop, scenery for the main actors frozen in their current tableau: expressions perfectly matched in a glaring, furious scowl. The first actor is perched in her usual chair, winched to almost six feet high despite several strenuous objections from those who helped put this apartment together. Her slanted mouth is drooping so much that chubby, pink-hued skin wrinkles almost unnaturally as she wears her stubbornness like a crown, throwing herself into it as breathlessly as her father, arms crossed and glaring barely a foot away from her, ever had.

They’re so close their foreheads are nearly touching, the same vein throbbing bright, bright blue across their right temples.

Even from his angle, John knows, the way he always knows—the way he _only_ knows. He’s heard the rumors, the tsking tongues that wag when Hurricane Rodney has blown by, leaving bitten-off orders and angry commands in his wake. It’s only the fact that the subject of his imprecations never loses her sunny smile, blue eyes—god, so very blue from the moment they opened—never shadowed or upset, that more serious measures aren't taken.

She knows too, John amends. Not all of it, not like John does, but she sees what the others can’t.

“Hey.”

Five years and more of teaching Rodney a soldier’s skills and nothing John’s ever done can match what not quite two years of this new training has accomplished. Rodney whirls, face slack as he loses his anger in favor of attacking this new threat, mind clearly already seething with insults, hands raised and clenched white, heralding the choreographed attack-plan that made Ronon blink with wonder—and approval—the one time Rodney was convinced to describe it. Rodney's fights have always been with numbers, with words that lash more cruelly than any of the flimsy jabs his body makes—except for her. Once, and only once, has John ever seen Rodney go feraly, incandescently furious and he doesn't want to ever see it again.

He's not sure he could survive seeing _both_ Rodney and Mere in that kind of danger, again. And he's taken great pains to make sure he doesn't have to.

“What!” Rodney shouts, hand clenched tightly over his heart. “Are you _trying_ to give me a heart attack? And you,” he whirls around, knuckles red and raw-looking as blood flows back over them, fingers pointing accusingly, “do not think this is some kind of reprieve because you are wrong and I am right, and I will make you see this, god—” 

The final word is broken off into what everyone else always assumes is a growl of anger.

It isn't anger. Rodney angry is red-faces and cutting words and sharp, violent gestures—it isn't this kind of wild frustration and helplessness, useless flailing and imprecise words.

John doesn't get why others don't see the difference. Rodney's not hiding it, not at all. But always John's left blinking as someone else talks about how angry Rodney is.

Rodney's not angry. He's _scared._

“Hey,” John says again. Obliquely assured of his welcome, he sidles up against Rodney and wraps an arm around his waist. Neither of them are sure when touching became the ground they traded back and forth like a stone rubbed smooth and warm, but John doesn’t think about it all that much; it works, and there are precious few alternatives. So he doesn't question, just links his fingers in Rodney's belt-loop, arm tight as he dares around Rodney's back, aware that Rodney’s heart is beating faster than a robin’s, quick, quick, quick.

Really terrified, then, and not just the low-key fear they've slowly gotten used to.

With his free hand, John reaches out and tweaks Mere’s growing dark hair. It’s black, of all bizarre things, and the way it’s currently cut makes it look like a mohawk, feathery and fine as it arches down to her eyes, catching in too-long lashes.

Mere doesn't even spare him a glance. That's unusual, since she normally giggles when her hair's tugged, but not really surprising. Nor is the marble-stubborn “No!”, the increased intensity her only acknowledgment of her doubled audience.

“Won’t eat?” John guesses. It’s her newest game, and surprisingly effective. Rodney breezed through diapers and burping and the general liquid, stinking, disgusting mess of an infant with only the barest of complaints. His hypochondria miraculously limited itself to _real_ issues, like when the mess in her diapers turned bright green—no more crayons ever again, John mentally repeats the way he always does at that memory—and things had gone better than anyone had a right to expect from him. It was _John_ who'd had difficulty handling a snot-and-vomit dripping infant, crying her heart out, when just moments before she'd been clean and dry and clinging to him with warm, chubby arms.

Those things, according to Rodney, were as normal as leaky pipes and machinery that regularly broke down because of something small and stupid. He could _handle_ those things, even when Mere was crying herself sick and John was edging towards the door, white-faced and panicky.

But once Mere suddenly had a personality, the will and ability to call her nervous parents on their mistakes—that's when Rodney lost his confidence. Suddenly all the tummy problems weren't accompanied by stories of when Rodney had gone through the same thing, or Jeannie's emails about a similar occurrence with Robbie, a bare year older than his cousin. Now they were dealt with hesitantly, watching for the slightest difference Mere would then pounce on, widening the cracks with the innate skill of a child sensing weakness in her parents.

And for Mere to stop eating, the one thing Rodney could always do...

It all makes sense to John, watching from his trusted position, but the rest of the expedition finds it utterly baffling. _But she can talk_ , more than one has protested, _it's_ easier _now!_

Sometimes John forgets that Rodney’s an open book with missing, so long as no one notices the hidden, blank pages at the end, full of whispers and secrets no bold black lettering could ever truly reveal.

John hides his smile against Rodney’s jaw, rubbing so that his wristband rasps against Rodney's pants soothingly; decoders don’t have to be rings or keys, he's learned. The best contain no vinegar or lemon-juice, but instead the most innocuous, random objects in ones life, and more precious because of it. “What’ve you been trying to give her?”

Rodney points wordlessly the scattered containers of various foods—MRE’s, labeled containers from the mess, the home-made containers that used to contained various baby foods from the Athosians, pleased at offering this type of help to their sometime-friends. All of them are half-open, their contents spilled in messy, multi-colored dollops as varied as the box of markers that's become her new favorite toy, spread all over the white counter top. Several of the largest messes match the colors rainbowing the corner of Mere's mouth.

She’s pouting at them now, John notes, amused. Her pouts are just as dangerous as her father’s, but Rodney never realizes how often he _does_ pout, so the expression usually sends him into yet another round of terror.

That, of course, manifests as anger. “I told you not to teach her that!” he accuses, still leaning against John like his own knees can’t hold him up. “I knew it’d be a bad thing, because _she’s_ a bad word, a very, very bad word I can’t actually call her because Teyla will find out with her magic bad-word detector that she so made up but is always right—how does she do that?—and make me pay for it with things that make me sweat while she and Mere go tra-la- _bad word_ -la, and Ronon plays foosball with my _head.”_

Rodney’s rants have grown increasingly incoherent over the last two years. Fortunately, John’s either just as incoherent or he's gotten better at translating Rodney: who doesn't know how to handle a child that doesn't want to eat, and is panicking that he's done something genuinely wrong, and that Mere will never recover from it.

He's got some very strange ideas as to what Mere's never going to recover from, and John is only slightly horrified to learn he finds that endearing. Especially when this particular bout of will-need-therapy-forever is due solely to Rodney's forgetfulness. “Uh huh. You ever think her magical ability to call us out is mostly cause she just knows us that well?” He disengages from Rodney, who immediately sags, clutching at the messy tray that holds the remains of his daughter’s lunch, and heads towards the refrigerator.

"Voodoo," Rodney snaps, but he's distracted by Mere looking cute up at him, lower lip blatantly extended. She's too young to be this manipulative, John constantly says, and despite the maternal chuckles he gets, in some ways he's right. Mere is as much of a genius as her father is, but she's got John's ability to read and react to people—Rodney speculates she gets it through pure osmosis and John's forced to agree—and the combination is nightmare inducing.

After all, she's already got him and Rodney firmly wrapped around her finger. What's going to happen when she's old enough to actually _want_ the boys chasing after her? Or girls, John hastily amends, stomach not any less queasy.

"Well, I suppose knowing us is kind of like voodoo," John teases as he opens up a red plastic container. Yup, it's all still there, untouched, which means Rodney totally forgot and John feels a little less sorry for him. At least he does until Rodney makes a tiny, mournful noise that's been known to stop John's heart when he hears it, because he knows exactly what it means. Still, he tries to play it off by not looking, only tilting his body back towards the McKay's: _yeah, yeah, what's wrong?_

“Don’t think I can’t read how condescending your hips are,” Rodney snaps, but there's not enough anger before the hesitation kicks back in. It’s an audible thing, Rodney's hesitation, heavy and pregnant as the silence grows, without the reassuringly familiar sound of his breathing to offer a pattern to follow. “John. She won’t _eat.”_

John's stomach twists because he can't hear that tone of voice and not react. There's no artifice or ego coloring it, none of the drama and bravado that billows around Rodney like a cape, making him three times as big and ten times as loud. Like this, Rodney's not a genius—just a man who doesn't have any idea what the hell he's doing, and his ignorance is hurting the ones he loves.

He turns around slowly, mind racing for some kind of reassurance pitched so Rodney doesn't freak out even more—and finds he doesn't have to. Meredith McKay, the younger, understands far more than her imperious attitude implies, and if there's one thing she knows, it's her Daddy. Both the pout and the scowl are long gone, replaced by something anxious and worried and sweet enough to prompt tooth decay. She's got both her messy, wet hands wrapped tightly around as much of Rodney's fingers as she can fit, tugging them to get Rodney even closer to her. She wants to hug him, John knows, wrapping her tiny body around him, with her blue eyes brighter than the sky that outlines their faces, and as familiar as the ones John catches himself looking into when it’s quiet at night and Rodney’s caught up in some movie or debate and never notices John’s scrutiny.

“Daddy,” Mere says and tugs harder, mouth pursing like she's already sucking her comfort-thumb, despite how hard they've worked to break her of that habit. “Daddy!”

It takes a harder man than John Sheppard to withstand something like that, and if Rodney weren't so certain it's his fault she's like this, he'd have already swept her up against him already.

Shaking his head, John breaks up the scene by popping a ripped-off piece of turkey in her mouth right before the tears start. It works, the rich taste distracting her into chewing noisily, a drop of clear spit dribbling down her chin even as she continues tugging long after Rodney starts looking thoroughly humiliated—disgusted—and annoyed with himself.

John offers him the rest of the turkey slice, watching as he feeds bits and pieces of it to a slowly reassured Mere. By the fifth piece she's grinning at them, bits of turkey meat visible through her gap-toothed smile.

"I forgot," Rodney says, taking another slice from John and leaving it on Mere's tray; she's very independent and dislikes being fed by others, most of the time. Rodney must've been at the end of his rope to even try it, if John's guess is correct and she'd refused all the mashed-up food they'd had her on for the past week, while a gum-infection went away.

"Well, that's obvious," John teases.

He tries to make it gentle, but Rodney still stiffens, offended. "Look," he says, "I just didn't want to—I don't want to be that—"

John's heard it before and knows he'll hear it again, but for now it's easy enough to close the distance between them, kissing the rest of the sentence into nothing and licking away all the hurts Rodney carries with him, terrified he'll repeat the same mistakes he lived through.

John knows he won't. He'll make new and different mistakes, just like John knows he is, but this is the sorest spot Rodney has, so John doesn't try to talk it quiet anymore. He just kisses until Rodney kisses him back, desperate intensity gradually slowing to something softer, warmer, that involves touch more than it does tongue.

Nobody in John's life kisses like Rodney McKay.

“Better?” he asks, eventually.

Rodney nods, head tucked against John's neck so that his nose rasps against stubble. "Yes, yes, I'm fine," he sighs.

John doesn't need his nifty decoder to know Rodney _is_ fine now, heart beat slowing to something a little under imminent cardiac arrest. Rodney lives for problems and their solutions and reaching that solution—even if it's not him that gets there—provides its own reward.

“Hey, it’s what I’m here for,” John says, smirking now that Mere is reassured her father's okay and is happily demolishing her second turkey slice. One missed meal isn't going to hurt her—she's a little on the roly-poly side, no matter that her regular check-ups always come back dead normal—but John doesn't have to think too hard to be where Rodney was, stupid-panicked because such a fundamental necessity was being fought. 

"You know," he tells her while she imitates a catfish, long trails of turkey held at the corners of her mouth, "you coulda just _told_ him you wanted the turkey."

Mere gives him the most innocent look to never, ever work, and eats her whiskers. "Mmmm, Papa," she says.

John shakes his head when he's offered a slightly chewed-on piece and wraps his arms more tightly around Rodney as they watch Mere go through not only the turkey, but the remains of what was probably some sort of fruit-puree before she turned it into Picasso art on her dinner-tray.

When she's done, she wipes her face until she's good and smeared, and then stretches her arms up to the two of them.

John's not really the kind of guy who cuddles. Rodney's _definitely_ not that guy, usually barely able to stand a few moments of an embrace that doesn't lead to sex or sleep, but he hasn't moved away from John yet, and anyway, it's becoming something like a tradition.

Mentally sighing at the state of their soon-to-be-washed clothes, John stretches just enough to lift her out of her chair and shifts and grunts until she's only mostly squashed between the two of them, both of their arms under her rump, while she rests an ear over John's heart, a forehead pressed trustingly against Rodney's chin, her arms reaching up as high as they can go on both of them before she clings as tightly as a barnacle.

"Seepy," she says, sighing contentedly.

"So go to sleep," Rodney says, and for once, doesn't correct her on the mispronounced word.

The three of them stay there while the sun glints pure, liquid gold as it slips past the edge of the window, blinding them even as it alters the shadows at their feet. Outside, a bird calls faintly above the steady lap of water edged around Atlantis, the only lullaby Mere ever needs to speed her off to sleep.

"Thanks," Rodney says. Mere's breathing is slow and even through her pink mouth.

John kisses first his head, then Mere’s, and leans back against a wall that should be dented and darkened by the shape of his shoulders, by now. He can't see anything but sunlight right then, but then, he already knows what he needs to. “S’what I’m here for,” he repeats, secure in the knowledge that Rodney has his own version of a decoder ring.

Between them, Mere snuggles closer.


End file.
